Auchtoon!

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Family magazine, September 2009

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, September 21, 2009

I wish I had more time to write about ArtPrize, because I’ve really enjoyed it so far. For those of you in and around West Michigan, it would be hard for you not to know about it. For those outside, here’s a quick primer:

ArtPrize is an international art competition, being held in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The exhibition will be from September 23 to October 10, 2009. ArtPrize is unusual both for the size of the top prize ($250,000, combined with other prizes cummulatively amounting to half a million dollars), as well as for the method of judging entries. There is no juror. The artists negotiate a venue with local exhibitors, and the works will be voted on by the public using modern networking technology.

And really, it’s not much more than that, which to me is the charm. Some works have exceeded expectations, some have confounded, some have thrilled, some have puzzled, some have offended, some have inspired, some have, well, you get the idea. And that’s what the cartoon was trying to convey — there has been a wide range of reactions (maybe even to the same piece of art). But the point is that people are moving through the streets of Grand Rapids and having reactions.

Hmmm… That all sounded a little too artsy, didn’t it? How about this instead: When Jane and I visited Wednesday, I saw an enormous table and chairs that has been plunked on top of a bridge, people constantly walking into other people’s camera shots (really funny when it’s not happening to you), pictures of naked painted ladies, plus we got a free beer. AND I successfully parallel parked (on the first attempt) in a free, on-street spot. There. That sounds more like a good time, right?

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, September 14, 2009

I kind of make it seem like this actually happened. To the best of my knowledge, it didn’t. But it could have. And “could have” is all you need in the cartooning world. (Have you noticed that the world is becoming more and more cartoonish every day?)

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, September 7, 2009

Actually, the first metaphor that came to mind for this didn’t involve vampires. Rather, I thought of moles that occasionally attack my yard. Well, “attack” is perhaps needlessly inflammatory — I guess it’s really more of a herd migration. A slow, underground herd migration. Not very majestic, but let’s move on.

When the moles show up, there was a time I would try to battle them off with traps, poison pellets, castor oil, and occasional curses. I fought the good fight and had some minor victories, but — being unwilling resort to intense chemical warfare, the moles generally ate what they came to ate and then left. Now that’s how it goes. When the moles get tired, they leave. And we have so many dang trees, my yard has limited areas of mole-preferred feeding grounds so they aren’t around for long. But, that said,  it’s much easier to think of the recession in terms of vampires than moles (and much more fun to draw), so that’s the way I went.

Slightly off-topic, but still comics related. I read a blog called The Comics Curmudgeon. The blogger (bloggist?) is a guy name Josh Fruhlinger and the idea is that he reads newspaper cartoons so you don’t have to and explains what’s going on. Generally these are the older serial strips like Mary Worth, Apartment 3G, Mark Trail, etc. But he also opines on “funny” strips. And by “funny,” I mean “funny” (the quotation marks with the full intent of indicating the word has the opposite meaning). This is of course a recipe for the sort of snarky, tedious blog that drains the soul. But Josh is an excellent writer and actually pulls it off quite well.

The reason I tell you this is because I was another bout of “why in God’s name are there so many crappy comic strips still cluttering the newspaper pages when there are clearly infinitely better ones available (Frazz, Speed Bump, Pearl Before Swine, Cul de Sac, to name a few) to replace them?” Today’s entry — and the particular comic strips he chose — seemed to illustrate my thoughts.

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, August 31, 2009

The easiest crowd-pleasing editorial cartoon to draw is the one with a sketch of something horrible or stupid, then slap a “government” label on it. Yes! Stupid, horrible government! Always messing up EVERYTHING!!! Government dumb-heads! We mock you because you are stupid and horrible all of the time!!!

Which is fine for editorial cartoonists. We’re under deadlines, and we really can’t be expected to think up new ideas all the time, can we? But, you… you not-editorial cartoonists! When you default to an “all government is bad” diatribe, well, that’s just being intellectually lazy.

And while I would love to spend a couple paragraphs taking you to task, I have some work to do so I can pay all of my money in taxes to the stupid, horrible government! But I leave you with this classic from Monty Python’s Life of Brian, “What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?”

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Family magazine, August 2009

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, August 24, 2009

Mr. Fitzthrower is a surly toe-cramp of a man who figured out the answer to everything 30 years ago and is just aching for somebody to express a view remotely to the contrary so he can unleash the pack of nonsensical expletives he kennels in his soul. Ms. Pantybunches is a rigid scanning-electron-microscope of a woman whose senses are entirely narrowed to detect that which she might take offense for the sole purpose of delivering her case for said offense in such excruciating detail that your internal organs race to escape through your ear canals. They meet, fall in love, and wacky hijinks ensue.

Anyway, that’s my idea for the next great American sitcom. What’s yours?

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, August 17, 2009

As a young man barely out of my teens, I would often make the summer pilgrimage to Pennsylvania to visit relatives with my then girlfriend Jane. My only living male relative, my great Uncle Mike, would be keen for some guy time, so I would take him on a field trip. This meant revisiting old stomping grounds (read: bars) in the City of Reading. The one I remember best is the Walnut Tavern, at Ninth and Walnut, just up from the Ludens candy factory and kitty-corner to St. Paul’s Catholic Church.                               

Uncle Mike had actually lived for some time in a room adjacent to the Walnut Tavern, so he pretty much knew all the barflies. He seemed to hate them all, but he knew them. Anyway, picture this: an oppressively hot late morning in a stifling old city made of brick, me winding a borrowed Buick down the warren-like streets, holding up traffic to drop my 80 year-old uncle with bad knees off near the door and then finding a street spot near to parallel park(!), catching up with my uncle, entering the bar, the light disappearing, the air becoming hotter and denser, and the smell of old dust, latrine, and regrets filling my air cavities. Got that?

Uncle Mike and I would sit at the bar. You didn’t want to sit at a table. Those were taken by the young ne’re-do-wells using the pool tables, the “Porta Rickins,” as Uncle Mike called them. (I could never tell if they were in fact of Puerto Rican decent — it was much too hazy to make out facial features. Besides, I was advised not to make eye contact.) The bartender would never actually acknowledge me. My uncle would order whatever and the bartender would put whatever in front of me. Mostly it was Heinekens. My uncle was hell on Heinekens. He would dismiss all other beers (especially massed produced American beers) with a barely audible curse and a twitch of his cane, like a cat burying something nasty.

Now realize this is not yet noon, I was hungry for lunch, and I wasn’t much of a drinker. Things would start to get weird. Generally an old man would sit down at the other side and try to engage me in conversation — except not with actual words but with kind of words and indecipherable hand gestures followed with a laugh. I would laugh along and that seemed to make those guys happy. Eventually Uncle Mike would advise (loud enough for the guy to hear) that he was a crazy [expletive], and I shouldn’t pay any attention to him. Nobody ever seemed at all bothered by this. As the beer ran through me, I’d stumble off to the bathroom to try to regain my senses. This only made reality worse; the bathroom had not been cleaned since the Roosevelt administration (not sure which Roosevelt) and was certainly no place to linger.

But getting around to my point and this week’s comic: At 11:30 the Price Is Right would come on the TV above the bar at an obscenely high sound level. As the TV was the only light source, it was hard not to look at it. So to recap: It’s morning, I’m drunk, I can’t breath, I can’t see much, my uncle is telling me stories about awful things that he had experienced in life, I’m surrounded by lunatics and ruffians, and Bob Barker is frickin’ screaming at me to guess the price of canned peas. …Yep, not too different from the health care debate. 

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, August 10, 2009
Click here for a larger (and possibly readable) version.

Every once in a while I’ll see my boy Atticus stomping away from the computer in our living room. In years past, this was a pretty good indication that either the CD game he was playing wasn’t working right (and typically due to the scratches, boogers, and finger prints on the playing side from improper storage and handling), or he had lost the game. The second eventuality was highly improbable because he always played the lowest levels — especially in Backyard Sports — so he could win, say, hockey games 47 to 0.  I would point out that he should perhaps consider a higher level, but he’d very logically tell me that it was just as much of a challenge to see if he could make it 48 to 0 the next time. What he was actually telling me of course was, “buzz off, old man.”

Anyway, these days if he’s stomping off, chances are he has just read the comments under a posting of something he likes. For example, on YouTube one can view a Weird Al video (or a Weird Al tribute video or a Lego version of the tribute, and so on) and then scroll down to see what other users had to say about it. The problem is that my boy is a sensitive kid who assumes that the people posting these comments are decent folks with actual opinions. They are not. And it doesn’t take long to find something nasty or witless or tangential or incomprehensible or needlessly confrontational. It’s usually the last kind get him.

So I give him this advice, advice — in case you think me some sort of Luddite who simply doesn’t get this Internet communication thing — also dispensed to him by his two teenage sisters: Never read the comments. Never. Ever. DO… NOT… SEEK… THE COMMENTS! No possible good can come from them. Except maybe inspiration for an editorial cartoon. Maybe.

Originally published in the Grand Rapids Business Journal, August 3, 2009

Busy working my small business hiney off this morning; check out this Free Press article for the backstory on the comic….